Friday, November 29, 2013

It has been a great week! Lots of stuff has happened this last week. Yesterday our branch became a ward finally after 30 years of people praying for it to become a ward. It was pretty awesome, President Wright told us about 3 days ago that something big was going on this Sunday. You should have seen the members of the now wards faces when the stake presidency walked in, it was pretty funny.

It was a really big day for Woodstock. Anyway, I'm glad that president wright sent you the pictures of the baptism. [The investigator that was baptized a couple of weeks ago] received the Aaronic priesthood on Sunday. He will be baptizing his daughter on the December 7th i think. We gave (the daughter) over to the sisters to teach because she is a 10 year old girl.

Transfers on Wednesday were fun. I didnt have to do absolutly anything, so that was nice, I got to talk to all my buddies and hang out with them, so that was fun. I didnt see Dallin but I did see my boy taylor. I did have to wait for a long time while Elder Zander was in his meeting though. [A member] took us and the sister missionaries to transfers and bought us Cafe Rio after:)) Yesterday after the big day at church we were invited over to a members house with the [family who was recently baptized and some of their friends for an early thanksgiving dinner! It was very good and we got to play some baseball in the sub flippin zero temps we are having, they live up in the mountains too so it was fun. But the weather here is sooooooooooo bitter cold it is not even funny. 30 degrees here feels like 0 degrees back home.

By the way, we split wood with a splitter and a member's house on Friday and I forgot my camera but the wood pile we split was 6 feet tall by 30 feet wide. It was insane how much we wood we split. Anyways so I have been working out a lot in the apartment lately and eating lots of food so I finally decided to weigh myself because I looked at myself in the mirror the other day and noticed I was getting big. So i weighed myself and I weigh 171 [lbs]!!!!!!!!! It was a nice scale too. I weighed myself like 6 times to check too, and this is with my shirt off and everything. I cant believe I have gained that much. I have been benching a lot in the apartment though lately and can lift about 15 more pounds and do about 20 reps more than I could at the beginning of my mission. I was kind of freaked out at first, but I like I am really glad now.

But anyway, I hope you are all having a great week and Have fun on Thanksgiving! We dont have to proselyte on Thanksgiving so thats cool, we will be over at the[new member's house] for awhile then we get to go play basketball with our district in Front Royal, so I am excited for that. I have to go, but I love all you guys very much. I forgot to mention we got an awesome young kid about 20 years old who is a new investigator and is very interested in the gospel. Hope to here from you soon. Sarah and Lynz I love you a lot stay out of trouble! ;)

Monday, November 18, 2013

This past week has been the best
week of my mission hands down! So first off one the traveling assistant came
out [tracking] with Elder Z and I from Thursday to Sunday. He goes home one Wednesday
and served in Woodstock earlier this year and wanted to come back here for his
last week, so it was really good and pretty fun to have him with us and have a
tripanionship.

We had a super fun and good week
and did crazy amounts of service, just one of the many things we did was rake a
acre of leaves that completely covered the whole yard. It took about 4 hours
with us three, the two sister missionaries and another person. I have a HUGE
blister on my finger from it haha.

And of course the best part was
the Hodges were baptized on Saturday and confirmed by is on Sunday! It was such
an awesome experience and it was so nice to see our hard work pay off.Elder Z and I baptisms are
the only baptisms for the month of November for our huge two part zone.
President Wright was stoked, he was telling us about how extremely rare it was
to have a couple baptized out here in Virginia; he said it has been a number of
years since it has happened. He is taking us to a Mexican restaurant on Tuesday
with his best bud Brother Funk on Tuesday.So anyways Elder Z and I are
both staying in Woodstock! When its all said and done Elder Zander will have
been here at least 6 months and I will have been here for 4 and half [months]!
That’s a very long time for people to be in an area.

Elder R also said that to
have the same companion for 3 transfers is almost unheard of. Elder Z was
called to be the new district leader here too, to replace our old district
leader who is going home. So yea you could say it has been a crazy week but it
was sooo awesome.

We still have to go to transfer
meeting two and a half hours away though so Elder Z can go to the meeting
for district leaders, but its cool because we get Cafe Rio after :)) ha-ha. So
because I am the district leader’s companion I will be going on lots of
exchanges with other elders because Elder Z has to go out with every elder
at least once a transfer in our district. I will also have some weird extra
free time because he will be on the phone a lot.

But anyway, I hope you are all
doing well. Tell Sarah to watch out or else I might have to come home early and
throw some little boys heads together, ha-ha just kidding. I am glad to here
all is going well with you guys and yes mom you were defiantly blessed to have
such good children, just like we have been telling you all along, (ha-ha, just
kidding).

Anyways I love you all very much
and am so grateful for all of you. I hope you have a great week :)

Friday, November 8, 2013

I think president Wright
told you that I was not going to be able to email you yesterday because we had
mission conference with Elder Carlson of the seventy. The conference was pretty
awesome, it was an 8 hour meeting and Elder Zander and I had to wake up at 4:45
in the morning to get showered and car pool with the sister missionaries down
to Fredrick, Maryland.

Elder Carlson talked
for about 4 hours about how to consecrate ourselves as missionaries and
answered lots of questions that missionaries had. We all got to talk to him and shake his hand; he is a retired four star
general.

Besides the awesome
instruction that we received I also got to see all of my missionary friends and
hang out with all of them so that was cool. After the meeting half of the
missionaries went to Cafe Rio in Fredrick and man it was soooo good haha.

This last week has
been a pretty good one. [One family investigators] are on date for the 16th so
no one has been baptized yet but they will. The word of wisdom is a killer out
here, but they are doing very well with it.

Thanks for the
letters you all sent me this last week as well as the emails your letter and
emails always make me smile. I’m glad Sarah and Lynz are doing well and are
enjoying school. Enjoy your time in school because you will miss it when it’s
over. So anyway the weather here is pretty dang cold. It doesn't really ever snow here, but the
humid cold is terrible sometimes, haha. Its pretty crazy that transfers are
only two weeks away and I could be somewhere else, I really hope not because we
already have 3 dinner appointments set up for thanksgiving!

I’m so glad that I
decided to come on a mission, I know that there is no way I could be spending
my next 21 months any better then on a mission. I feel like I have been the one
that has learned so much on my mission so far.
I’m so grateful for the testimony builder that it has been so far.

Anyways I hope you
all have a great week and that everything goes well! Dad I am glad to here the
Jazz are doing terrible because they will be good when I get back haha. I love
you guys very much, I am so proud of you guys and your efforts to try and teach
those guys the gospel.

If all the members
in the world did what you guys did and helped the missionaries, then this work would
be able to move so fast. If you get a chance watch the original hastening the
work video, it is way good and helps me remember how important missionary work
is.